~~~High Search Engine Rankings~~~
Moderator's Comment: It's that time of the month again folks...I'm
cleaning out my question box and answering a bunch of shorter
questions this week instead of the usual long one. Enjoy!
Jill
From: Colin Ford
Are tables that great an obstacle to achieving high rankings? Is there
a way to make tables more "spider friendly"? Where is the best place
to put keyword-rich content in a table?
Thanks for your help.
Colin
~~~Jill's Response~~~
Hey Colin,
Nearly every site these days uses tables of one sort or another. It
would be pretty difficult to make a decent-looking site without using
tables. I personally have never found tables to be an obstacle for
high search engine rankings. Search engine robots seem to be able to
read the text within tables just fine. There are a few things to
remember when using tables, however. The first table cells will be
read first by the search engines. This means that all the copy that
you put into the middle of the page (assuming a two- or three- column
format) will be read after the left-hand column. Personally, I don't
find this to be damaging at all. However, there are other optimizers
who believe that your most important keyphrases should be in the first
column (which is usually reserved for your navigation buttons or
links). If you are really worried, you can put some nice headlines
with Header tags such as <H2> or <H3> at the very top of your page,
outside of the table, and these will be read first by the engines.
This will give you the double whammy of being first AND utilizing
Header tags. I find this to work very nicely. As an aside, please
don't simply stick your keyphrases in these headlines. Complete
sentences are much more effective and also make more sense!
Another thing you can do is use textual navigation links in your first
column, as opposed to graphical buttons. Put your keyphrases within
the links, and again, you've got another double whammy. If you prefer
graphical links in this column, don't worry about it. But DO remember
to use keyphrase-rich Alt tags where you can. As we discussed in issue 048, these can
give your site a bit of a boost.
Like I said, I don't personally worry about tables and the engines.
As long as the text is on the page, is well written, and is utilizing
your keyphrases (and you have a Title tag to match), the search
engines will usually find it and index it. For those that have the
need to utilize every trick in the book, there is something out there
called the "Table Trick" which is a way of placing your main table
section of code first, so the search engines will spider it *before*
the navigational section. Jere Matlock describes how to implement
this at: http://www.wordsinarow.com/tabletrick.html. Again, I've
never used this, nor do I think I would, but many people swear by it
and it is *not* considered a spam technique.
Good luck!
Jill
~~~Next Question~~~
From: Andrew Leighton
Hi,
Great site, wonderful advice. My question:
Even though say, 4 keywords are well placed in my META, why do search
engines find say, 2 of them but not the other 2, even though all 4 are
close together? Also, when I re-arrange the words into different order
and search on them, I get radically different results. If search
engines
find one keyword in your META, shouldn't they be able to find them
all?
Very best regards,
Andrew Leighton
Business Monitor International
~~~Jill's Response~~~
Hi Andrew,
I'm sure our regular readers will already know the answer to this one.
But since it's something we get asked all the time by potential
clients, etc., it bears repeating.
Meta keyword tags have little or no bearing on how the search engines
find your site.
You can rearrange the words, the order and the proximity all you want,
and it's not gonna make a heck of a lot of difference to your
rankings. While you might think that the search engine found one
particular word in your Meta tag, it's more likely that the engine
found that word either in the Title tag or within the body text copy
itself.
Don't worry too much about your Meta keywords. Instead, spend
that time creating a content-rich site that naturally uses your most
important keyphrases within the text!
Jill (No, we cannot simply change your Meta tags) Whalen
~~~Next Question~~~
From: Erica Friedman
Firstly, let me thank both of you for such an informative and fun
newsletter. I'm sold on the need for SEO, and spend time tweaking my
own websites to play with many of the concepts that you write about in
your newsletters. And luckily for me, my supervisor is *also* sold on
the idea of effective SEO.
Here's the snag I'm hitting:
Our clients want good results, but they don't really understand what
SEO is, or why it's so important. PowerPoint presentations can only do
so much by way of convincing a recalcitrant client. So, are there any
good resources that I can turn to that will support the need for
quality SEO? Statistics, studies, anything? Has Rankwrite or either of
you done any studies on SEO results? Thank you very much for your
help and again -thanks for a great newsletter!
Cheers,
Erica Friedman
Library and Information Services
Conectics
~~~Jill's Response~~~
Hey Erica,
It's so interesting to me that most of the Internet population still
has to be "sold" on the benefits of SEO (Search Engine Optimization).
I think part of the reason that many Web design companies don't bother
with it is because they've never been able to do it right, so they
figure it just doesn't work. (See my rant on this in issue 050
)
However, as everyone on this list knows, when done correctly, search
engine optimization does indeed work and can even make or break a
company. It is true that not every company needs to get found in the
search engines. But many companies that have a Web site get all or
most of their business through the Internet. The search engines can
and should be a major source of traffic for them. Many businesses
have seen tremendous growth in customers and sales, because they're
easily found in the major search engines and directories. Who would
have thought that a gastric bypass surgeon in Georgetown, KY would
grow his very small practice into an extremely successful, thriving
practice, and be the envy of his colleagues, simply because his Web
site is found in the first page of results? I'll admit that I never
thought it would have that kind of effect. But this is exactly what
happened, and only in a matter of months. This exemplifies what the
Internet is all about. People researching their options and finding
just what they're looking for through the search engines. If your
site is not optimized correctly, you won't be found during this
all-important research phase, and you'll never know what highly
targeted traffic you might be missing!
For more on how search engine optimization can dramatically affect a
company's bottom line, please see my article at: http://www.rankwrite.com/seobottomline.htm. I believe the kinds of
stories and numbers discussed in this article are very powerful and
could be what you need to convince your bosses and clients of the need
to be found. It's really a question of results. If you know what
you're doing and can get high rankings for relevant keyphrases people
actually search for, SEO is definitely worth it. If you really can't
produce results, or they're spotty at best, then it may *not* be worth
the time and expense.
Have fun!
Jill
~~~Send Us Your Questions~~~
If you have questions about online copywriting or search engine optimization (or both!), just zip us an email to questions@rankwrite.com. We've had some folks ask if their question
was "too basic" to be printed - and you don't have to worry about
that! There are no "stupid" search engine optimization or copywriting
questions, so ask away!
